Twin bolts of lightning emanate from a cloud northeast of Cedar Rapids, Iowa around 8:50 PM, Sunday, October 23, 2011, as an autumn thunderstorm rages, seen from Bowman Woods Park. The storm, though appearing very close in this image, actually skirted east of the city and left nary a drop of rain at this location. The photo was captured shooting a 12-second exposure at f/3.5, 800 ISO and an 18mm focal length.
The planet Jupiter, shining at a bright -2.91 magnitude (main image) is shown in the ESE sky around 10:18 PM, Thursday, October 20, 2011 from Bowman Woods Park in Cedar Rapids, Iowa. The inset image at right shows an enlarged view of the planet (200mm focal length), including a bright streak at its lower left caused by the reflection of two of its moons Callisto and Europa. The main image was a 20-second exposure shot at f/5.6, 3200 ISO and a 55mm focal length.
With a smattering of altocumulus clouds in the western sky, low shadow angles are created on the grounds of Bowman Woods Park in Cedar Rapids, Iowa by the setting sun around 5:00 PM, Friday, October 28, 2011. Temperatures were in the mid-50s.
Cirrocumulus undulatus clouds
Lightning lashes from the underside of a rolling bank of clouds as torrential rain falls behind it around 8:50 PM, Sunday, October 23, 2011. The spring-like thunderstorm was created from spring-like conditions, which included temperatures in the lower 60s. This view looks northeast from Bowman Woods Park in Cedar Rapids, Iowa. Two storm systems passed to the west and east of Cedar Rapids, missing the city, with the eastern system being much more extensive in size. This was an 8-second exposure at f/3.5, 800 ISO and an 18mm focal length.
Having received reports of Northern Lights (Aurora Borealis) activity as far south as the state of Arkansas I grabbed my camera and set out in hopes of catching the spectacle for myself just after 9:30 PM on Monday, October 24, 2011. This view of the northeast sky was taken around 9:43 PM about a half-mile north of County Home Road on the C Avenue Extension north of Marion, Iowa. Cloud streaks along the horizon show up reddish, possibly illuminated by the Aurora? Also splashed across the sky here was the constellation Auriga (left), dominated by its bright 0.06-magnitude star Capella; the Pleiades cluster at right center and the -2.92-magnitude planet Jupiter at upper right. Below the Pleiades is the constellation Taurus. This image was a 20-second exposure at f/5, 1600 ISO and an 18mm focal length.
Cloud-to-cloud lightning forks from the underside of passing cloud cover looking northeast from Bowman Woods Park in Cedar Rapids, Iowa around 8:47 PM, Sunday, October 23, 2011. Warm conditions (63 degrees F at this hour) helped ignite a line of thunderstorms whose SW edge is seen here about 10 miles distant, with the rest of the line stretching northeast to nearly Milwaukee, Wisconsin. The storm missed Cedar Rapids, passing east of the city as it moved in an ESE direction. Another smaller cell located southwest of Cedar Rapids also missed the area. This image was captured with a 10-second exposure at f/3.5, 800 ISO and an 18mm focal length.
Passing mid-level cumulus
This image is a shorter exposure version of my October 4 posting. It shows the planet Jupiter (bright object just above the roof) located in the eastern sky just SE of the zodiac constellation Aries as seen from Brentwood Drive NE in Cedar Rapids, Iowa around 9:45 PM, Monday October 3, 2011. The exposure settings for this shot was: 20 seconds at f/3.5, 800 ISO and an 18mm focal length. Jupiter held an apparent magnitude of -2.86. The planet is the fourth-brightest object in our skies.
Iowa State University meteorology student and storm chaser Sam Schreier walks hurriedly back to his vehicle while keeping an eye on a developing wall cloud (upper right) as it prepares to cross 210th Street a couple miles west of Ute, Iowa around 7:10 PM, Saturday, April 9, 2011. Note the rain shaft in the distant background. In about five minutes the wall cloud would drop a tornado, eventually growing in strength to an EF3, and would significantly damage the town of Mapleton about 15 minutes later. Shortly after this photo was taken our chase teams jumped back into our two vehicles and headed north, staying just outside the storm's SE flank but coming no closer than five miles of Mapleton, where we had actually driven through the town from the west about a half hour earlier. This view looks southwest.
A dark gray bank of cumulus clouds in the sky contrasts sharply with the vibrant autumn color and sunshine on the ground as seen from Bowman Woods Park in Cedar Rapids, Iowa around 4:25 PM, Friday, October 14, 2011. The clouds were moving in an ESE direction. This view looks northeast.
A tornado churns the ground northwest of the town of Arthur (city lights) in western Iowa around 8:28 PM, Saturday, April 9, 2011. The track of the storm was to the northeast, between the towns of Ida Grove and Arthur. This view, a video frame capture, looks NNW from along County Highway M31, about one mile south of town. Our two-vehicle chase team was stopped on the road after having followed the twister, which minutes earlier had a wedge shape. The brightness of this image was made possible by a flash of lightning.
The planet Jupiter (center) withstood the bright onslaught of a full moon as seen here looking east from Bowman Woods Park in Cedar Rapids, Iowa around 10:12 PM, Tuesday, October 11, 2011. The apparent magnitude -2.88 Jupiter is in actuality 41 times larger than the moon, but is also about 460 million miles farther away. The 2.06 magnitude variable star Algol ("The Demon Star"), in the constellation Perseus, is seen at upper left. Clear skies of eastern Iowa were a contrast to the rainy skies in western Iowa at this hour and mild conditions prevailed (58 degrees F). The silhouetted tree in the foreground at left is an European Larch. This image is a composite of the background sky and the moon. The background was an 18-second exposure at f/6.3, 200 ISO and an 18mm focal length. The moon, 1/2,000-second exposure at f/5.6, 640 ISO and a 200mm focal length.
At left is a sequential set of images captured from three video frame stills at
Dry corn vegetation debris is caught in midair above a row of stalks in front of a sky dotted with cumulus humilis clouds around 1:56 PM, Sunday, October 9, 2011. This view looks east from along the Boyson Park trail in Marion, Iowa, about .25 mile south of Boyson Road and about .6 mile west of Alburnett Road. Unseasonably warm temperatures (lower 80s) and breezy conditions persisted here in a dominant high pressure system in the midwest.
Light from a mobile floodlight plays across the bottom of this image in Bowman Woods Park in Cedar Rapids, Iowa around 8:12 PM, Wednesday, October 5, 2011. The floodlight was being used to illuminate a soccer field in the direction of the right side of the picture. The bright star at lower right is the -0.07 magnitude Arcturus, in the constellation Bootes. A half-moon (toward the left) washed out a great number of fainter stars. This was a 17-second exposure at f/5, 500 ISO and an 18mm focal length.
Clear skies, dry conditions and mild temperatures (53 degrees) produced this photo-stacked image of the eastern sky from 9:33-9:45 PM, Monday, October 3, 2011. The image is a product of three four-minute exposures. The bright object just above the roof (left center) here on Brentwood Drive NE in Cedar Rapids, Iowa is the -2.85 magnitude planet Jupiter. Settings to achieve this picture included an f/3.5 aperture, 200 ISO and 18mm focal length. The two bright streaks at upper left are the stars Almach (left) and Mirach in the constellation Andromeda.
A group of Iowa State University meteorology students observe the approach of a forming wall cloud (background left) from 210th Street, about one mile west of Ute, Iowa just after 7:00 PM, Saturday, April 9, 2011. The storm chasers were using this position as a storm initiation vantage point. They are, from left: Ethan Milius, Ryan Alliss, Bryce Link, Tristan Morath, Nick Carletta, Sam Schreier and Tyler Roney (I was part of car #1 at left). This view looks southwest and the storm's movement was left to right in the image. About 15 minutes later a tornado from the wall cloud touched down and would arrive at the town of Mapleton as an EF3 around 7:30. Note the airborne pieces of corn vegetation near the utility pole at right center. The high inflow winds were causing the power lines to whine, causing all of us to wonder if it was the sound of a tornado.
Unlike the higher ground of the bordering residential areas in the foreground, a white coating of frost covers the ground in the lower lying areas of Bowman Woods Park (background) in Cedar Rapids, Iowa around 7:50 AM, Sunday, October 2, 2011. Clear skies, light winds and temperatures in the lower 30s created this effect.
The sun peeks over the horizon in this view looking east along Boyson Road from Doubletree Road NE in Cedar Rapids, Iowa around 7:12 AM, Saturday, October 1, 2011. The short streaks in the sky at left center are aircraft contrails.
Posts
All Comments
© Blogger template On The Road by Ourblogtemplates.com 2009
Back to TOP
